Movie Review: The Fall Guy (2024) *Minor Spoilers*

When I initially heard they were making a movie version of the TV series, The Fall Guy (1981-86), I was definitely interested, as a person who tuned in to that series, weekly, when it originally aired.

I had intended to see The Fall Guy in the cinema but, for whatever reason, didn't get there, and didn't prioritize seeing the film as the reviews, and more importantly, general information about the movie came out. Specifically, The Fall Guy makes no effort to capture whatever magic it was the TV show had that made it the show it was.

A fact that is driven home by the reworked TV series theme song, played over the end credits and behind the scenes footage of stunts in the film, that removes all references to real world actors and replaces iconic line of "I'm the unknown stuntman who made Redford such a star" with the nonsensical "I'm the unknown stuntman who tries to win your heart." - sure... I guess... I mean, the original song is about never getting the girl, but okay.

The TV series, while it did often show Colt Seavers (Lee Majors) on movie sets being a stuntman, was more about his side hustle gig as a bounty hunter, where his stuntman skills often came into play.

The movie, on the other hand is about stuntman, Colt Seavers (Ryan Gosling), who is tasked with recovering his 'leading man', Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) who he's been stunt doubling for years, and has gone missing. At the same time he must navigate a rocky relationship with the film's director, Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt), that kind of ended a year earlier, after a serious on set accident.

I'm honestly glad I didn't see this in cinemas. It's not that I had any expectations for what it should be, I just found it difficult to stay engaged with, and would've been disappointed.

It's very much an example of a movie that has a lot of really great individual scenes, performances, and action but it just doesn't fit together as a whole.

For example, I really loved Hannah Waddingham's over the top performance as producer, Gail Meyer. It's right up there with Tom Cruise's performance as Len Grossman in Tropic Thunder in terms of lampooning that type of character in the movie industry.

As you would expect, there are a lot of great stunt sequences, both for the movie being made within the the film, and for the film itself. Some are stunts you see all the time, others are more complex sequences that may seem similar to other films you've seen. All are done well but nothing is particularly ground breaking. Although one was, in real life, record breaking.

Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt are both good choices for the leads, though, while I've seen Emily convincingly be an action star in other films (Edge of Tomorrow a.k.a. Live, Die, Repeat springs to mind), her character in The Fall Guy seems remarkably capable at hand to hand combat for a camera operator turned director.

Aaron Taylor-Johnson also gives a fun, over the top performance, that only comes into question by Ryan Gosling being (arguably) the bigger star in real life.

Somehow this movie is a missed opportunity, let down by a script trying to be a little too clever. The mystery side of things I found very hard to follow, with weird fight set ups, and the bad guys trying to kill the same guy they need alive to take the fall for the whole situation they have (I think?).

It's safe to say, whatever this is, it isn't an adaptation of the original TV Series. The title of movie definitely describes what it is, it just needs a subtitle "Not the One You Remember".

I may need to do a re-watch to really appreciate how entertaining this film actually is. It's certainly fun, and not a bad movie by any means. I just hope there's a producer somewhere that sees this adaptation of The Fall Guy and decides to give it another try, being a little more faithful to the TV Series this time.